Contact your Council member. Stop the trampling of property rights and the killling of an affordable housing development.

On Tuesday, January 2nd 2018 the Council will vote on  BILL NO. BL2016-219 on Third

proposed The Ridge at Antioch

and Final Reading.

This bill is the attempt to kill an affordable housing project and trample a person's private property rights by cancelling an approved Planned Unit Development and down zoning a person's property without their consent.  To take away a permitted use is a "taking."  Property rights are more than just holding legal title.  When property is taken it should only be for a public purpose and owners should be compensated for their loss.

This bill has been disapproved by the Planning Commission.  For more on this story see this link and this and this.  This bill has been in the works for a very long time.  To view the July 6, 2016 Public Hearing on the bill follow this link. It was deferred indefinitely following that public hearing. It was on the agenda on third reading on April18, 2017  and at that time it was deferred to this meeting, the second meeting in December. At that meeting it was deferred to the Jan.2nd 2018 meeting.  Being a dissapproved bill, this will take 28 votes to pass and there will be a roll call vote. I will record in this blog, how members of the Council voted.

Here are reasons members of the Council should vote against this bill"

• This is a "taking" of property.  It is wrong to take someone's property without taking it for a public purpose and compensating the owner.  Owning property is more than simply holding title, it is a bundle of rights. This is taking away from the property owner the right to develop his property a right he currently enjoys. The owner is already vested in the development of the property, having already invested in development cost and arranged financing. 

• We need affordable housing in Nashville. We cannot meet the need by building a handful of units as infill in established neighborhood.  The proposed development is for an apartment complex of over 200 units. This proposed affordable housing project should not be thought of as "the projects" or something similar. Unless someone told you, you would not even know this type housing had a subsidy. This planned development is a "tax credit" property. The people who will live there are people who work. The rent will not be based on an individuals ability to pay, but the rent will be "affordable" for a person of modest income. This is what is often called "workforce" housing. 

• If this passes, Nashville is likely to be sued and will likely lose the law suit.

•  The Tennessee Housing and Development Agency  has said that if this bill passes, they will withhold low income housing tax credits from Nashville and give them to other jurisdictions. This would be a blow to the future development of affordable housing in Nashville.

• Traditionally Nashville has not rezoned someone's property without the owner requesting it. 

• This is a disapproved bill. Generally, the council should follow the recommendation of the Planning Commission and respect the process.

Please contact your council member and the council members at large and ask them to vote against BILL NO. BL2016-219.   You can find the council members phone numbers and email addresses at this link. When you open the link, click on " Council Roster 2015-2019" for phone numbers.  

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